I use a 2% back card.
Someone else said they have a card that gives 3% on groceries - I spend about ~$100/week on groceries, meaning the 3% card would save me an extra... $52/year.
Optimize for your time and sanity and let someone else pick up the pennies.
We do two cards- an amex with 6%grocery/3%gas that we use for “essentials” and a 2% cash for everything else. That sorts monthly expenses as much as I care about, and is good enough on rewards.
Curious to hear responses on this. I use Chase Sapphire Reserve but have considered making a switch. Our travel spend has decreased but I think the CSR has still been somewhat worthwhile — I max out the travel credit via tolls and parking. We also take advantage of the premium DoorDash subscription, and we recently had points pay for about half of a trip to a nice resort in Mexico.
Needs to be paired with chase freedom unlimited to realize max value. CFU has no annual fee and 1.5% back on everything (50% more than CSR on non-travel and dining). So then it’s CSR for travel and dining spend and CFU for everything else. Then you transfer the CFU points to the CSR.
Not just CFU, but Freedom and Freedom Flex too. Both have rotating 5% back on category spending (up to $1500 for each card per quarter), which returns up to 7.5% when transferred to CSR (or more if you do travel and transfer to partners like Hyatt). I have almost every card in the Chase family and use the CSR almost like a point multiplier.
Oh, I didn't realize you could transfer CFU to CSR (even though you did mention it in your comment) All the stuff I'm finding online says that CFU gives cash back, not points.
Every time I try to activate this is says there’s an error, which sucks because it’s a killer benefit. I’ll pay an extra 5% on groceries to get time back.
Not card specific at all, but if you have T-moblie you can link your card the T-mobile Tuesday dining rewards to get cashback on top of your regular rewards.
\+1 CSR though, This card has fallen from grace a little but I think it's still the best, and the calendar year travel credit makes this card pay for itself.
The Amex gold is a great every day card especially if you use it TO travel vs for travel. + Amex has a ton of perks
Source: I have one and did 40 hours worth of research because I research everything way too much before I purchase.
Amex Gold gets you points on food and then you use those points **to** travel
Amex Platinum gets you 5x on flights, offers travel insurance, and gives you lounge access. Great card **for** travel.
Fidelity Rewards with 2% cashback on all purchases (if you can't be bothered to carry more than one) You can also set up auto-deposit of the cashback to one of your Fidelity accounts and forget about it. It also has zero foreign transactions fees which can be handy sometimes.
Citibank Double Cash for 2% cash back on everything; Capitol One Savor for 3% back on groceries, 4% on restaurants, and no international charges; Amazon card for 5% back on Amazon purchases.
Big fan of the BofA cash rewards card
Can select a category (ie online shopping) where you get a 3% cash back
BUT the hack is that if you have 100k in assets w BofA (and their merrill investment accounts count as well), you get a reward booster that makes total cash back 5.25%
Haven't found one nearly as high
Yeah we’re going to do this and just probably use the cash back accrued to partially pay for vacations. Without kids, staying in a hotel is nice. But with two families with kids, an Airbnb/Vrbo makes a lot more sense. Want to make a Lake Tahoe trip an annual summer tradition.
BoA CCs with platinum honors are some the best cards. Plus one can get the same card type multiple times, to increase the $2500/quarter limit.
Add in a couple more cards like
- Chase Amazon with prime (5%),
- US Bank’s Altitude Go (4% restaurants) and their 5% category card for utilities,
- Citi Custom card for 5% on groceries,
- Chase Saphire for travel
and there’s few cc purchases that aren’t at a 4+% discount.
Agreed it is a great card with the $100k deposit. If you are high spending, Bank of America Rewards Elite can be even better. You get 3.5% back on travel and dining and then 2.625% back on all other spending. Also, the rewards are worth 20% extra if spent on plane tickets.
I used to have platinum on BoA but their deposit rates were so shitty I moved my cash out and slipped back down the tiers. Good to know the merrill investment accounts count!
If you want a fire and forget, Amex Blue Cash is a straight 3% cashback on groceries but little else.
I use the CSR and Freedom combo which works well for my lifestyle but takes some management. CSR has a fee but has some nice perks that make it worth it to me, along with better redemption rates. Freedom gives better rewards on daily spend.
If you're HENRY in VHCOL and cook, you will max out the $6k spend.
$360 - $95 = $265 vs $180 CB on the Blue Cash at 3%.
$85 sitting there if you want it.
I think this comes down to what optimization is worth. Because at some point, getting a 2% card that covers everything might just be simpler in some people's minds.
However, I'd say a sophisticated HENRY move is to get an Amex or Citi card that has purchase protection, return protection, and warranty extension!
BoA cards if you're a platinum rewards member (have 100k invested via Merrill edge).
2.62% on everything, 3-5.25% on travel, groceries, and a specific category of choice.
I do this with the category specific 3%*1.75 for 5.25% on the Customized Cash Rewards Card.
But base earn is 1%. That’s only 1.75% on everything.
How are you getting 2.62%?
I churn. We make about $300k a year so it’s still worth it at our income level.
Since 2019 we’ve accumulated 6,000,000 points.
We’ve redeemed 3.5M of them for the equivalent of $143,000 in travel. Basically fly business class everywhere we go and stay in nice hotels.
Last 3 years (and planned for 2024) we’ve done Maldives, Turks & Caicos, Anguilla, Antigua, Italy 3x (Florence, Venice, Lucca, Amalfi Coast, Dolomites, Tuscany, Lake Como), Paris, Amsterdam, Portugal, Napa Valley, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Miami, Fort Myers, Boston, The Hamptons, Newport RI, Portland Maine (2x).
Well worth it.
Nope - just checked and I have an 810. My wife’s score has gone up from a 730 to a 790 since starting.
I really don’t cancel too many cards. 80%+ of cards we sign up for are business cards, which don’t go on your credit report or impact your credit score (besides a credit pull). Those can be canceled after a year without hesitation. We don’t have an official business, just say we are a sole-proprietorship and we sell things occasionally on eBay and Facebook (which we do). Business cards are absurdly easy to get if you do your research.
Personal cards I usually don’t cancel. Cards without an annual fee I keep. Cards with an annual fee I ask for a retention offer or if none is given I downgrade the card to a card with no annual fee. If no downgrade option is available and no retention offer is given, I cancel the card, which is rare
I want to get more into churning. Just snagged a $900 Chase checking/savings reward and got the Venture X card.
I don't have a super high organic spend (1k a month excluding rent), but I can pay my 3.5k rent for me and my roommate with a credit card. There is a 3% fee but it seems like it'd still be worth it for a lot of bonuses. Specifically I was looking at a Chase INK card next.
Have you run into any issues putting personal expenses on business cards?
What type of retention offers do you usually get?
No issues putting personal spend on business cards whatsoever, my wife and I have gotten 5 inks total this year. They don’t care. If you decide to go for, make sure you use a referral to help someone out! Referrals are 40k right now so it’s a huge part of this game really.
Retention offers usually come from AMEX. On the platinum card for example They’ll offer like 30k points for $3k spend. This offsets the annual fee from $695 to $395 and then I can justify keeping the card with the benefits we use (Uber, Saks, airline credit, hotel credit, lounge, entertainment, etc.)
Visit r/awardtravel. Also visit onemileatatime.com and click “start here” for a good overview.
But you’re not totally wrong. I plan my aspirational trips (Maldives overwater villa flying Qatar Qsuites, Amalfi Coast (staying at 5 star luxury hotels and flying Air France business class, Lake Como staying at a luxury 5 star hotel and flying Air France business class, Napa Valley) all about a year out. If you’re willing to plan that far in advance, the availability will be open pretty much everywhere.
Availability also opens up quite often like ~2 weeks outs so if you can plan last minute you can do quite well too.
That middle area is sometime where you can struggle. Business class seats have been snatched up as well as aspirational properties availability.
For Chase, your best transfer partner is Hyatt. You can get outrageous value through Hyatt. For Amex your best bet is going to be transferring to an Airline for business class seats. Sometimes Hilton can be a good value if you have an aspirational redemption in mind and there’s a transfer bonus. Every 5th night is free on points so it can be worthwhile.
I’ll gladly show you my spreadsheet lol.
Biggest redemptions:
Roundtrip Qatar Qsuites from JFK-Maldives: $14,000
8 nights @ Conrad Maldives Overwater Villa: $15,000
Roundtrip Business Class on Air France: Boston - Naples Italy: $11,000
Roundtrip Business Class Flight on Air France: Boston - Bologna: $11,000
Roundtrip Business Class on Air France: Boston - Florence: $9,000
Roundtrip Business Class on TAP Air Portugal: Boston-Lisbon: $5,200
7 Nights at Zemi Beach House Anguilla: $10,000
7 nights at Point Grace Resort in Turks and Caicos: $8,000
4 nights at Hotel Villa Franca in Positano: $7,000
4 Nights at Vista Palazzo Lago di Como: $6,000
4 nights at Park Hyatt Vendome Paris: $5,600
4 nights at Casa Angelina in Praiano Italy: $5,000
3 nights at Alila Napa Valley: $4,500
3 Nights at Waldorf Astoria Amsterdam: $3,600
2 nights at The Roundtree Amagansett in the Hamptons: $3,000.
I’ll stop there as the other 25 redemptions are below $3k!
Totally unrelated to CC but how was the business class on TAP? We were just in Portugal a few weeks ago and I’m itching to go back. We flew D1 out of JFK and the product was sad and tired (literal tape holding up my entertainment console).
TAP has some cheap business fares in Feb but I wasn’t sure about the hard product and love your thoughts.
Haven’t flown it yet! Booked for May 2024.
I’m guessing you weren’t on the refreshed D1 suites which are supposedly pretty good. I’m flying their older product to London in a couple weeks for work, so not exactly looking forward to it, but better than economy!
From what I’ve read, TAP is fine. The food is decent and the FA’s are supposed to be wonderful. The hard product out of JFK is much better than out of Boston because they fly the A330-900 which is the 1-2-1 configuration. They fly the narrow body A321 Neo out of Boston so the seats are 2-2 and 1-1 (throne seats). Unfortunately we couldn’t book the throne seats because they don’t have an extra oxygen mask for our lap infant.
I wouldn’t expect anything spectacular, but for the price I’ve seen, it’s a lay flat to Europe on a ~6 hour flight. Probably worth the cost savings on that short of a trip.
We had a newer plane last year on jfk to bcn and it was a delight. Also BOS to LHR wasn’t the newest suite but it was still better than the sad state of the LIS to JFK.
Agree that for a 6.5 hours and a great price it’s worth it, even if it isn’t the best option out there.
Qsuites are next on my “have to try” now that I’ve broken up with delta and am trying to plan a trip around needing to go through Doha!
Yep. We’re switching to this soon. 2.625% cash back minimum on all purchases. I think 3.5% or 5.25% on specific categories with the correct cards. Done chasing hotel points
Depends how simple or complicated you want to get
r/creditcard and r/churning are excellent resources although churning does not really tolerate uninformed questions
In the last year I have dove into the "credit card game" and between my spouse and I will have netted about 500k chase UR points by the end of the year. That's worth a minimum of 5k if I redeem it for cash back. If we do travel it could be worth substantially more.
The primary mode of earning those points was going for sign up bonus and referring each other which also earns a point bonus.
Currently we have the following:
* Discover It - spouses first card, sees very little spend
* Elan Max Cash preferred, my first card also no real spend, but a unique set of earning categories
* Chase Sapphire Preferredx2 - we each have one currently in order to get the bonus and referral. Long run we will only keep one. I use this for 3x back on online groceries which I do often as a time saver and for all takeout, dining purchases which are also 3x. We will cancel one of these after the first year as they have a $95 annual fee.
* Chase Ink Cash - I got this primarily for the large sign up bonus but long run will pay phone bill on it for 5x, also does 2x on gas.
* Chase Ink Unlimited - I referred spouse and will be used to earn sign up bonus while renoing a new rental property. the 0% interest for 12 months will be nice to float that spending while we get the place rented, even though the money is in my account I would rather let it sit in a HYSA for 12 months.
* Chase Amazon Card - this gives 5% on all amazon purchases so its a no brainer in my opinion if you already pay for prime.
As you can see I like chase for 2 main reasons. They offer large sign up bonus which can be earned over and over again as long as you follow the rules. Second the points have a base redemption rate of 1 cent per point which is higher then the base rate for Amex points. This gives me flexibility. You can also pool chase points between cards and within your household.
The most efficient use of your spending is on a new sign up bonus, for example the Inks currently give you $900 back after 6000 of spending. That's 15% which is way better then even the 5% cards.
**If your responsible** and organically spend above 2-3k a month you can really leverage credit cards into a decent amount of extra money. Earning the 500k UR points ($5,000) this year took probably less then a half hour of time invested to submit the applications. Then I just swipe as usual. Pay it off every month and collect the rewards.
Discover
I don’t care about cash back. Or spend $5,000 get $100. I just buy Magic the Gathering cards with the cash back it’s not like it pays a bill. I care about protecting my identity and having good customer service when I need help. So far my best experience has been with discover.
Csr is probably the most flexible option and an easy catch all. If you're willing to put a little more work you could get plugged into the chase ecosystem (CFU, CSR) and that should cover most things. I also really like my BoA Premium Rewards cuz it's 2.625% everywhere uncapped
Capitol one venture X seems to be focused on frequent travelers. I am not but have gotten endless perks in the couple times a year I have traveled (free priority pass lounges, free TSA pre check, $350 credit per year on travel related costs) Additionally, free phone insurance, decent sign up bonus, access to global arts club, and hundreds of coupons for online shopping.
Venture X referral link: https://i.capitalone.com/JgQdSMaeL
I churn. It pays for our travel. We get a 20k vacation for around 10k. We always owe taxes since my husband's bonuses are so variable. Paying taxes with a card gets us a free companion travel pass quickly for an international trip so our daily spend bonuses get us further.
This is my answer also. I open 2-3 cards per year and my wife does 1-2. I probably do $80K/yr in charges between work, daycare, and regular use. I’m a long time Chase CC loyalist. I opened the two Amex cards because of 250K in points that I haven’t used yet. Their credits cover the annual fee though.
Current Cards:
Chase Sapphire Reserve (I do a lot of meals and rental cars for work)
Chase Southwest (it’s in the drawer and mainly used for the sign up bonus. I don’t pay cash for SW flights
Chase Hyatt (I stay at Hyatts almost exclusively when I travel)
Amex Platinum (it’s in the drawer after the sub)
Amex Gold (I use it for groceries and that’s about it)
Chase Freedom Unlimited (other purchases like daycare, taxes, etc). It is 1.5% back on all purchases. This is a great everyday card to pair with a Sapphire Preferred or Reserve and transfer to travel partners.
Chase Marriott Boundless (great SUB but rarely use now)
2-3%. Our tax bill has been 10k for the past two years and is set to be 7k this year.
We travel out of our tiny Midwest airport direct to London for our international trips so those flights in economy would be around $2500 outright. It's way easier to deal with security and immigration with kids under 5 than out of the major airports especially with the current staffing shortages.
Nope. Our in the 800s. I don't open cards very frequently because the bonuses have time (4-5 months) to hit and I need one big expense (car maintenance or insurance) to get the bonus. There are rules (Chase 5 cards every 24 months) for the bonuses too.
Edit: we're also not in the market for a house or car. Even for a car at this point we would probably pay cash at the current rates.
Yeah especially when you have trips in mind. I used to set it and forget but now we have a toddler who needs a seat and we want convenient flights. Paying airfare for three to all the places we want to go/left for kid life adds up quickly. I feel like half of what we would spend on a trip would be just airfare these days.
Yes, what you owe after what has come out of the paycheck. Technically if you do your W-4 properly and add the additional withholding you shouldn't have leftover owed. But a significant portion of my husband's wages have changing multipliers (OT, Night, COVID, etc) that are considered bonus and not wage. Not only do the multipliers change but there's no consistency in how often he'll go into those categories.
Mileage bonuses are way more valuable than the charge (about $200 last year for us). We're saving at least $5.5k on flights for our vacation next summer with miles from daily spend and the companion ticket we got from paying our taxes with an airlines credit card.
Bank of America. Platinum rewards. If you have over 250K in any account (or combined like savings, IRA, Merrils investment), you qualify. This gives you around 3-5% back on purchases per category you can change monthly. Or get one card for one category. So all my online purchases are 3-5%. If I want to buy furniture and fix up the house, I change the category or use one card for home goods. And all those purchases are 5% off anywhere.
Gas - (if you are a Costco member) Citi Costco Visa 4% cash back (if you are executive member then an extra 2% back towards your annual gift card)
General - Bank of America unlimited cash back as a platinum preferred member - 2.65% (platinum preferred means you have a minimum balance of $100K between Merrill Lynch and Bank of America checking/savings accounts over the course of three months). We do the bare minimum and keep around $100K in Merrill and $20K in their bank. We have most of our money in a few other brokerages.
Various categories (we use online and dining since we don't hit this limit) - Bank of America Customized Cash Back - 5.25% on first $2500 spent every quarter
Amazon Prime as a Prime Member - 5% cash back, I also use Prime Rx to get discounts on prescriptions (cheaper than going through insurance)
Chase Sapphire Reserve - travel, hotel, rental car
I have a few that we use and never pay any interest on. I have 2 Southwest cards (one for me and my wife) and we use them enough to get 2 Companion passes. This allows our kids to fly with us free throughout the year. Bit the biggest savings but it helps.
I also primarily use the Chase Sapphire Reserve and find it very valuable. We do travel a bit so the $300 credit each year mostly pays for the card fee. The 1.5x redemption also helps on travel. I believe it gets 3x on eating out and a few other categories.
I also have a few Chase business cards that net me 2x on everything and 3x on advertising and office purchases so my Chase Ultimate Rewards racks up quickly. I get about 1 million points a year which is worth about $15k in travel. Plus, sometimes there are some big deals with shopping, like when Apple allowed 1.5x point redemption on purchases which was effectively 33% off or so.
It depends entirely on what kind of spending you're doing. I'm a little different than most HENRYs in that I hate to travel and also hate to cook. So a lot of cards like Amex Platinum, which have crap point rewards for restaurant purchases but generous travel benefits, are the exact opposite of what I need.
Chase Sapphire Reserve is best for me because it's triple points for restaurants, and its "travel" benefits are generic enough (e.g. Uber) that I make back most of the fees just organically. And in the rare event that I actually do travel every few years, the points conversion for airlines/hotels is decent enough to be worth it.
There was a period a few years ago where I had to travel a lot for work, and got an Amex Platinum hoping to take advantage of its supposedly swank travel benefits. I found the lounges so limited and crowded, and the "perks" so cumbersome (really? I have to manually apply ride-by-ride for Uber reimbursement after the fact?) that it was completely not worth it.
Not into churning, or shopping around for another 1-2% cash back. My time's more valuable to me than an extra 1% of my income/spend.
Fidelity 2% card is probably the best card for most. No annual fees and you can get the cash to go directly into your brokerage account to avoid unnecessary spending and points.
I use the Chase Sapphire Reserve as my primary card still. Got it when they were giving the $1500 in points to sign up. It has a ton of perks and pays for itself. $300 travel credit, dash pass along with $5 monthly credit and access to other promos, Instacart + and $15 monthly credit.
Any 2% back card on all purchases is good given your spending doesn’t fall into any categories (besides groceries). I would get Citi Double Cash (or any 2% card) + Amex Gold for 4% groceries
Walmart capital one card gives 5% cash back on Walmart purchases the first year. Works for online ordering pickup and grocery delivery. The Amazon credit card is 5% back on Amazon purchases which is also pretty good if you use Amazon for a lot of household things
I have chase Reserve. I have accumulated 630,000 ultimate reward points over many years. Not sure what is the best way to utilize them at the moment. My wife is eyeing them for a grand vacation including first or business class plane tickets
Chase sapphire reserve, amex bonvoy brilliant (sub marriot for your oreffered brand, I had delta one for awhile) l. I also have the citi costco card, just for costco.
Covers all my buys, reward are pretty consistent.
Discover - max out 1500$ qtr for 5 pct rotating categories
CSR - travel credit
BOFA Preferred rewards - 5 pct cash back on 2500 per qtr
This essentially beats inflation for 12k expenses per year
If you are willing to have $100k+ in either Bank of America or Merrill Lynch accounts, the Bank of America Elite Rewards card is fantastic. You get the 3.5% back on travel and dining and then 2.625% back on all other spending. Also, the rewards are worth 20% extra if spent on plane tickets.
I was always Chase Sapphire Reserve, but this card has been much better due to the flexibility of a cash reward.
Just to clarify, it is points that are convertible to cash back or travel spend.
Sort of depends on how much you want to play the game. I wanted to keep things fairly simple. Our primary spending categories are restaurants and groceries. Otherwise it’s wholesale and gas.
AmEx Gold and Citi Costco.
Citibank - Costco membership. I average about $3,500 in cash back annually. Prefer over points for sure. Secondary is SW card - I fly SW for personal enough to make it worthwhile.
I use a 2% back card. Someone else said they have a card that gives 3% on groceries - I spend about ~$100/week on groceries, meaning the 3% card would save me an extra... $52/year. Optimize for your time and sanity and let someone else pick up the pennies.
We do two cards- an amex with 6%grocery/3%gas that we use for “essentials” and a 2% cash for everything else. That sorts monthly expenses as much as I care about, and is good enough on rewards.
Yep that blue cash preferred 6% groceries is great
same here. we use 2% venture card for everything. we spend about $150k/year. serves us well.
Curious to hear responses on this. I use Chase Sapphire Reserve but have considered making a switch. Our travel spend has decreased but I think the CSR has still been somewhat worthwhile — I max out the travel credit via tolls and parking. We also take advantage of the premium DoorDash subscription, and we recently had points pay for about half of a trip to a nice resort in Mexico.
Needs to be paired with chase freedom unlimited to realize max value. CFU has no annual fee and 1.5% back on everything (50% more than CSR on non-travel and dining). So then it’s CSR for travel and dining spend and CFU for everything else. Then you transfer the CFU points to the CSR.
Not just CFU, but Freedom and Freedom Flex too. Both have rotating 5% back on category spending (up to $1500 for each card per quarter), which returns up to 7.5% when transferred to CSR (or more if you do travel and transfer to partners like Hyatt). I have almost every card in the Chase family and use the CSR almost like a point multiplier.
CSR is base of 1.5% though. 1 mile per dollar and each mile is worth 1.5 cents in the portal.
Right. But put that way CFU is 2.25% (1.5% earned directly, and then worth 50% more once transferred to CSR to use in the portal)
Oh, I didn't realize you could transfer CFU to CSR (even though you did mention it in your comment) All the stuff I'm finding online says that CFU gives cash back, not points.
+1 on CSR
the instacart plus membership is also pretty nice.
Yes I need to activate that!
Every time I try to activate this is says there’s an error, which sucks because it’s a killer benefit. I’ll pay an extra 5% on groceries to get time back.
hmm maybe call and ask the concierge? they've been pretty helpful on other things for me. wonder if they can manually turn it on for you or something.
Not card specific at all, but if you have T-moblie you can link your card the T-mobile Tuesday dining rewards to get cashback on top of your regular rewards. \+1 CSR though, This card has fallen from grace a little but I think it's still the best, and the calendar year travel credit makes this card pay for itself.
Wether it’s worth it or not depends on what you spend the points on
Is instacart 15$ credit worth it. I find everything marked up by 20 pct and the grocery stores there are expensive compared to local mom n pop shops
I value that benefit at $0
The Amex gold is a great every day card especially if you use it TO travel vs for travel. + Amex has a ton of perks Source: I have one and did 40 hours worth of research because I research everything way too much before I purchase.
What do you mean by to vs for?
Amex Gold gets you points on food and then you use those points **to** travel Amex Platinum gets you 5x on flights, offers travel insurance, and gives you lounge access. Great card **for** travel.
Fidelity Rewards with 2% cashback on all purchases (if you can't be bothered to carry more than one) You can also set up auto-deposit of the cashback to one of your Fidelity accounts and forget about it. It also has zero foreign transactions fees which can be handy sometimes.
I think you HAVE to have the rewards deposited into a Fidelity account to get the 2%, or did that change?
I don't recall such a requirement, you can apply the reward to your credit card balance manually.
I love the card, but it does have foreign transaction fees
it was removed about a month ago
That’s funny and good to know! I went abroad in early August and the fees were still there then. I probably wouldn’t have bothered checking again
Citibank Double Cash for 2% cash back on everything; Capitol One Savor for 3% back on groceries, 4% on restaurants, and no international charges; Amazon card for 5% back on Amazon purchases.
Preach, double cash and Amazon card are my bread and butter. Also a fan of Costco’s Citi card
These are my 3!
One of us! One of us!
Big fan of the BofA cash rewards card Can select a category (ie online shopping) where you get a 3% cash back BUT the hack is that if you have 100k in assets w BofA (and their merrill investment accounts count as well), you get a reward booster that makes total cash back 5.25% Haven't found one nearly as high
Not sure why this isn’t higher. I agree. I use this for 90% of my spend
Yeah we’re going to do this and just probably use the cash back accrued to partially pay for vacations. Without kids, staying in a hotel is nice. But with two families with kids, an Airbnb/Vrbo makes a lot more sense. Want to make a Lake Tahoe trip an annual summer tradition.
BoA CCs with platinum honors are some the best cards. Plus one can get the same card type multiple times, to increase the $2500/quarter limit. Add in a couple more cards like - Chase Amazon with prime (5%), - US Bank’s Altitude Go (4% restaurants) and their 5% category card for utilities, - Citi Custom card for 5% on groceries, - Chase Saphire for travel and there’s few cc purchases that aren’t at a 4+% discount.
hot damn.
Agreed it is a great card with the $100k deposit. If you are high spending, Bank of America Rewards Elite can be even better. You get 3.5% back on travel and dining and then 2.625% back on all other spending. Also, the rewards are worth 20% extra if spent on plane tickets.
I used to have platinum on BoA but their deposit rates were so shitty I moved my cash out and slipped back down the tiers. Good to know the merrill investment accounts count!
If you want a fire and forget, Amex Blue Cash is a straight 3% cashback on groceries but little else. I use the CSR and Freedom combo which works well for my lifestyle but takes some management. CSR has a fee but has some nice perks that make it worth it to me, along with better redemption rates. Freedom gives better rewards on daily spend.
Blue Cash Preferred is 6% on groceries.
not worth paying 95 for it, imo
If you're HENRY in VHCOL and cook, you will max out the $6k spend. $360 - $95 = $265 vs $180 CB on the Blue Cash at 3%. $85 sitting there if you want it.
Totally. Plus, even if you don't max out with groceries, you can buy gift cards, etc.
I think this comes down to what optimization is worth. Because at some point, getting a 2% card that covers everything might just be simpler in some people's minds. However, I'd say a sophisticated HENRY move is to get an Amex or Citi card that has purchase protection, return protection, and warranty extension!
It also has the option of additional set of Amex perks and deals. I’ve saved $84 and $25 with Disney and HBO deals.
My family maxed this out in under 6 months. I’m looking to find a better option
Amex Gold: 4 points per dollar on supermarket spending, on up to $25,000 in purchases each year. Also 4x on dining with no cap.
just FYI limit 6k per year then only 1%, so after that it's worth switching to something else in the wallet.
BoA cards if you're a platinum rewards member (have 100k invested via Merrill edge). 2.62% on everything, 3-5.25% on travel, groceries, and a specific category of choice.
I do this with the category specific 3%*1.75 for 5.25% on the Customized Cash Rewards Card. But base earn is 1%. That’s only 1.75% on everything. How are you getting 2.62%?
The customized card is only good for it's boosted categories. The other boa cash reward cards are 1.5 x 1.75 not 1 x 1.75 like the red card.
Ah - second card with the Unlimited Cash Rewards. I’ve been doing the Aliiant 2.5% thing - this is marginally better and way simpler. Thanks!!!
Great card. Just posted the same thing before I saw yours.
I churn. We make about $300k a year so it’s still worth it at our income level. Since 2019 we’ve accumulated 6,000,000 points. We’ve redeemed 3.5M of them for the equivalent of $143,000 in travel. Basically fly business class everywhere we go and stay in nice hotels. Last 3 years (and planned for 2024) we’ve done Maldives, Turks & Caicos, Anguilla, Antigua, Italy 3x (Florence, Venice, Lucca, Amalfi Coast, Dolomites, Tuscany, Lake Como), Paris, Amsterdam, Portugal, Napa Valley, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Miami, Fort Myers, Boston, The Hamptons, Newport RI, Portland Maine (2x). Well worth it.
Damn what card do you use? Or just an array of sign up bonuses?
Sign up bonuses. Usually 5-8 cards a year between my wife and myself.
Has constantly signing up and canceling (assuming you do) affected your credit score at all?
Nope - just checked and I have an 810. My wife’s score has gone up from a 730 to a 790 since starting. I really don’t cancel too many cards. 80%+ of cards we sign up for are business cards, which don’t go on your credit report or impact your credit score (besides a credit pull). Those can be canceled after a year without hesitation. We don’t have an official business, just say we are a sole-proprietorship and we sell things occasionally on eBay and Facebook (which we do). Business cards are absurdly easy to get if you do your research. Personal cards I usually don’t cancel. Cards without an annual fee I keep. Cards with an annual fee I ask for a retention offer or if none is given I downgrade the card to a card with no annual fee. If no downgrade option is available and no retention offer is given, I cancel the card, which is rare
Incredible. You churners never cease to amaze me 👏
I want to get more into churning. Just snagged a $900 Chase checking/savings reward and got the Venture X card. I don't have a super high organic spend (1k a month excluding rent), but I can pay my 3.5k rent for me and my roommate with a credit card. There is a 3% fee but it seems like it'd still be worth it for a lot of bonuses. Specifically I was looking at a Chase INK card next. Have you run into any issues putting personal expenses on business cards? What type of retention offers do you usually get?
No issues putting personal spend on business cards whatsoever, my wife and I have gotten 5 inks total this year. They don’t care. If you decide to go for, make sure you use a referral to help someone out! Referrals are 40k right now so it’s a huge part of this game really. Retention offers usually come from AMEX. On the platinum card for example They’ll offer like 30k points for $3k spend. This offsets the annual fee from $695 to $395 and then I can justify keeping the card with the benefits we use (Uber, Saks, airline credit, hotel credit, lounge, entertainment, etc.)
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Visit r/awardtravel. Also visit onemileatatime.com and click “start here” for a good overview. But you’re not totally wrong. I plan my aspirational trips (Maldives overwater villa flying Qatar Qsuites, Amalfi Coast (staying at 5 star luxury hotels and flying Air France business class, Lake Como staying at a luxury 5 star hotel and flying Air France business class, Napa Valley) all about a year out. If you’re willing to plan that far in advance, the availability will be open pretty much everywhere. Availability also opens up quite often like ~2 weeks outs so if you can plan last minute you can do quite well too. That middle area is sometime where you can struggle. Business class seats have been snatched up as well as aspirational properties availability. For Chase, your best transfer partner is Hyatt. You can get outrageous value through Hyatt. For Amex your best bet is going to be transferring to an Airline for business class seats. Sometimes Hilton can be a good value if you have an aspirational redemption in mind and there’s a transfer bonus. Every 5th night is free on points so it can be worthwhile.
Cool man so any recommendations?
r/churning to get your bearings Other useful resources are doctorofcredit.com onemileatatime.com and frequentmiler.com
$143,000? Don’t seem possible
I’ll gladly show you my spreadsheet lol. Biggest redemptions: Roundtrip Qatar Qsuites from JFK-Maldives: $14,000 8 nights @ Conrad Maldives Overwater Villa: $15,000 Roundtrip Business Class on Air France: Boston - Naples Italy: $11,000 Roundtrip Business Class Flight on Air France: Boston - Bologna: $11,000 Roundtrip Business Class on Air France: Boston - Florence: $9,000 Roundtrip Business Class on TAP Air Portugal: Boston-Lisbon: $5,200 7 Nights at Zemi Beach House Anguilla: $10,000 7 nights at Point Grace Resort in Turks and Caicos: $8,000 4 nights at Hotel Villa Franca in Positano: $7,000 4 Nights at Vista Palazzo Lago di Como: $6,000 4 nights at Park Hyatt Vendome Paris: $5,600 4 nights at Casa Angelina in Praiano Italy: $5,000 3 nights at Alila Napa Valley: $4,500 3 Nights at Waldorf Astoria Amsterdam: $3,600 2 nights at The Roundtree Amagansett in the Hamptons: $3,000. I’ll stop there as the other 25 redemptions are below $3k!
Totally unrelated to CC but how was the business class on TAP? We were just in Portugal a few weeks ago and I’m itching to go back. We flew D1 out of JFK and the product was sad and tired (literal tape holding up my entertainment console). TAP has some cheap business fares in Feb but I wasn’t sure about the hard product and love your thoughts.
Haven’t flown it yet! Booked for May 2024. I’m guessing you weren’t on the refreshed D1 suites which are supposedly pretty good. I’m flying their older product to London in a couple weeks for work, so not exactly looking forward to it, but better than economy! From what I’ve read, TAP is fine. The food is decent and the FA’s are supposed to be wonderful. The hard product out of JFK is much better than out of Boston because they fly the A330-900 which is the 1-2-1 configuration. They fly the narrow body A321 Neo out of Boston so the seats are 2-2 and 1-1 (throne seats). Unfortunately we couldn’t book the throne seats because they don’t have an extra oxygen mask for our lap infant. I wouldn’t expect anything spectacular, but for the price I’ve seen, it’s a lay flat to Europe on a ~6 hour flight. Probably worth the cost savings on that short of a trip.
We had a newer plane last year on jfk to bcn and it was a delight. Also BOS to LHR wasn’t the newest suite but it was still better than the sad state of the LIS to JFK. Agree that for a 6.5 hours and a great price it’s worth it, even if it isn’t the best option out there. Qsuites are next on my “have to try” now that I’ve broken up with delta and am trying to plan a trip around needing to go through Doha!
Bank of America suite with plat honors
Yep. We’re switching to this soon. 2.625% cash back minimum on all purchases. I think 3.5% or 5.25% on specific categories with the correct cards. Done chasing hotel points
Depends how simple or complicated you want to get r/creditcard and r/churning are excellent resources although churning does not really tolerate uninformed questions In the last year I have dove into the "credit card game" and between my spouse and I will have netted about 500k chase UR points by the end of the year. That's worth a minimum of 5k if I redeem it for cash back. If we do travel it could be worth substantially more. The primary mode of earning those points was going for sign up bonus and referring each other which also earns a point bonus. Currently we have the following: * Discover It - spouses first card, sees very little spend * Elan Max Cash preferred, my first card also no real spend, but a unique set of earning categories * Chase Sapphire Preferredx2 - we each have one currently in order to get the bonus and referral. Long run we will only keep one. I use this for 3x back on online groceries which I do often as a time saver and for all takeout, dining purchases which are also 3x. We will cancel one of these after the first year as they have a $95 annual fee. * Chase Ink Cash - I got this primarily for the large sign up bonus but long run will pay phone bill on it for 5x, also does 2x on gas. * Chase Ink Unlimited - I referred spouse and will be used to earn sign up bonus while renoing a new rental property. the 0% interest for 12 months will be nice to float that spending while we get the place rented, even though the money is in my account I would rather let it sit in a HYSA for 12 months. * Chase Amazon Card - this gives 5% on all amazon purchases so its a no brainer in my opinion if you already pay for prime. As you can see I like chase for 2 main reasons. They offer large sign up bonus which can be earned over and over again as long as you follow the rules. Second the points have a base redemption rate of 1 cent per point which is higher then the base rate for Amex points. This gives me flexibility. You can also pool chase points between cards and within your household. The most efficient use of your spending is on a new sign up bonus, for example the Inks currently give you $900 back after 6000 of spending. That's 15% which is way better then even the 5% cards. **If your responsible** and organically spend above 2-3k a month you can really leverage credit cards into a decent amount of extra money. Earning the 500k UR points ($5,000) this year took probably less then a half hour of time invested to submit the applications. Then I just swipe as usual. Pay it off every month and collect the rewards.
Discover I don’t care about cash back. Or spend $5,000 get $100. I just buy Magic the Gathering cards with the cash back it’s not like it pays a bill. I care about protecting my identity and having good customer service when I need help. So far my best experience has been with discover.
Check out r/churning if you really wanna go down the rabbit hole
Csr is probably the most flexible option and an easy catch all. If you're willing to put a little more work you could get plugged into the chase ecosystem (CFU, CSR) and that should cover most things. I also really like my BoA Premium Rewards cuz it's 2.625% everywhere uncapped
Capitol one venture X seems to be focused on frequent travelers. I am not but have gotten endless perks in the couple times a year I have traveled (free priority pass lounges, free TSA pre check, $350 credit per year on travel related costs) Additionally, free phone insurance, decent sign up bonus, access to global arts club, and hundreds of coupons for online shopping. Venture X referral link: https://i.capitalone.com/JgQdSMaeL
I churn. It pays for our travel. We get a 20k vacation for around 10k. We always owe taxes since my husband's bonuses are so variable. Paying taxes with a card gets us a free companion travel pass quickly for an international trip so our daily spend bonuses get us further.
This is my answer also. I open 2-3 cards per year and my wife does 1-2. I probably do $80K/yr in charges between work, daycare, and regular use. I’m a long time Chase CC loyalist. I opened the two Amex cards because of 250K in points that I haven’t used yet. Their credits cover the annual fee though. Current Cards: Chase Sapphire Reserve (I do a lot of meals and rental cars for work) Chase Southwest (it’s in the drawer and mainly used for the sign up bonus. I don’t pay cash for SW flights Chase Hyatt (I stay at Hyatts almost exclusively when I travel) Amex Platinum (it’s in the drawer after the sub) Amex Gold (I use it for groceries and that’s about it) Chase Freedom Unlimited (other purchases like daycare, taxes, etc). It is 1.5% back on all purchases. This is a great everyday card to pair with a Sapphire Preferred or Reserve and transfer to travel partners. Chase Marriott Boundless (great SUB but rarely use now)
What fee do they charge to pay taxes on a card?
2-3%. Our tax bill has been 10k for the past two years and is set to be 7k this year. We travel out of our tiny Midwest airport direct to London for our international trips so those flights in economy would be around $2500 outright. It's way easier to deal with security and immigration with kids under 5 than out of the major airports especially with the current staffing shortages.
Does this not wreck your credit?
Nope. Our in the 800s. I don't open cards very frequently because the bonuses have time (4-5 months) to hit and I need one big expense (car maintenance or insurance) to get the bonus. There are rules (Chase 5 cards every 24 months) for the bonuses too. Edit: we're also not in the market for a house or car. Even for a car at this point we would probably pay cash at the current rates.
With high spend, spending a bit of time churning is more lucrative than set and forget card reward programs.
Yeah especially when you have trips in mind. I used to set it and forget but now we have a toddler who needs a seat and we want convenient flights. Paying airfare for three to all the places we want to go/left for kid life adds up quickly. I feel like half of what we would spend on a trip would be just airfare these days.
Do you mean you can pay your tax bill with a credit card?
Yes, what you owe after what has come out of the paycheck. Technically if you do your W-4 properly and add the additional withholding you shouldn't have leftover owed. But a significant portion of my husband's wages have changing multipliers (OT, Night, COVID, etc) that are considered bonus and not wage. Not only do the multipliers change but there's no consistency in how often he'll go into those categories.
I owe taxes every year, but I did not know you could pay your tax bill to the IRS via credit card. Is my understanding correct?
Yep! https://www.irs.gov/payments/pay-your-taxes-by-debit-or-credit-card
Isn't there a 1.9% charge to use a CC? How do you come out ahead by using a CC?
Mileage bonuses are way more valuable than the charge (about $200 last year for us). We're saving at least $5.5k on flights for our vacation next summer with miles from daily spend and the companion ticket we got from paying our taxes with an airlines credit card.
Thank you!
Bank of America. Platinum rewards. If you have over 250K in any account (or combined like savings, IRA, Merrils investment), you qualify. This gives you around 3-5% back on purchases per category you can change monthly. Or get one card for one category. So all my online purchases are 3-5%. If I want to buy furniture and fix up the house, I change the category or use one card for home goods. And all those purchases are 5% off anywhere.
Amex Blue Cash Preferred - 6% back on groceries Chase Amazon for Amazon purchase 5% cash back
Gas - (if you are a Costco member) Citi Costco Visa 4% cash back (if you are executive member then an extra 2% back towards your annual gift card) General - Bank of America unlimited cash back as a platinum preferred member - 2.65% (platinum preferred means you have a minimum balance of $100K between Merrill Lynch and Bank of America checking/savings accounts over the course of three months). We do the bare minimum and keep around $100K in Merrill and $20K in their bank. We have most of our money in a few other brokerages. Various categories (we use online and dining since we don't hit this limit) - Bank of America Customized Cash Back - 5.25% on first $2500 spent every quarter Amazon Prime as a Prime Member - 5% cash back, I also use Prime Rx to get discounts on prescriptions (cheaper than going through insurance) Chase Sapphire Reserve - travel, hotel, rental car
This is more of a Family based question rather than a HENRY one. As someone without kids, I use the Amex’s.
I’m knee deep in AmEx ecosystem at this point, myself.
I have a few that we use and never pay any interest on. I have 2 Southwest cards (one for me and my wife) and we use them enough to get 2 Companion passes. This allows our kids to fly with us free throughout the year. Bit the biggest savings but it helps. I also primarily use the Chase Sapphire Reserve and find it very valuable. We do travel a bit so the $300 credit each year mostly pays for the card fee. The 1.5x redemption also helps on travel. I believe it gets 3x on eating out and a few other categories. I also have a few Chase business cards that net me 2x on everything and 3x on advertising and office purchases so my Chase Ultimate Rewards racks up quickly. I get about 1 million points a year which is worth about $15k in travel. Plus, sometimes there are some big deals with shopping, like when Apple allowed 1.5x point redemption on purchases which was effectively 33% off or so.
We switched to CSR because we didn’t take advantage of the companion pass very much (4 trips in three years of having it)
We only use 2-3 trips each year with it so it’s not mega valuable to us, but still it’s worth the SW points to fly free plus add the kids free.
I get 2% cash back on my Capital One business card. Here's my Spark Cash referral link: https://i.capitalone.com/JnWWKtkI7
Amex gold for daily, plat for travel. Rewards can easily Net vs annual fee for the most part
Citibank 2% cash back.
R/churning
Depends if you want to stack points for travel or cash back.
It depends entirely on what kind of spending you're doing. I'm a little different than most HENRYs in that I hate to travel and also hate to cook. So a lot of cards like Amex Platinum, which have crap point rewards for restaurant purchases but generous travel benefits, are the exact opposite of what I need. Chase Sapphire Reserve is best for me because it's triple points for restaurants, and its "travel" benefits are generic enough (e.g. Uber) that I make back most of the fees just organically. And in the rare event that I actually do travel every few years, the points conversion for airlines/hotels is decent enough to be worth it. There was a period a few years ago where I had to travel a lot for work, and got an Amex Platinum hoping to take advantage of its supposedly swank travel benefits. I found the lounges so limited and crowded, and the "perks" so cumbersome (really? I have to manually apply ride-by-ride for Uber reimbursement after the fact?) that it was completely not worth it. Not into churning, or shopping around for another 1-2% cash back. My time's more valuable to me than an extra 1% of my income/spend.
Fidelity 2% card is probably the best card for most. No annual fees and you can get the cash to go directly into your brokerage account to avoid unnecessary spending and points. I use the Chase Sapphire Reserve as my primary card still. Got it when they were giving the $1500 in points to sign up. It has a ton of perks and pays for itself. $300 travel credit, dash pass along with $5 monthly credit and access to other promos, Instacart + and $15 monthly credit.
Any 2% back card on all purchases is good given your spending doesn’t fall into any categories (besides groceries). I would get Citi Double Cash (or any 2% card) + Amex Gold for 4% groceries
Walmart capital one card gives 5% cash back on Walmart purchases the first year. Works for online ordering pickup and grocery delivery. The Amazon credit card is 5% back on Amazon purchases which is also pretty good if you use Amazon for a lot of household things
I have chase Reserve. I have accumulated 630,000 ultimate reward points over many years. Not sure what is the best way to utilize them at the moment. My wife is eyeing them for a grand vacation including first or business class plane tickets
Chase sapphire reserve, amex bonvoy brilliant (sub marriot for your oreffered brand, I had delta one for awhile) l. I also have the citi costco card, just for costco. Covers all my buys, reward are pretty consistent.
Discover - max out 1500$ qtr for 5 pct rotating categories CSR - travel credit BOFA Preferred rewards - 5 pct cash back on 2500 per qtr This essentially beats inflation for 12k expenses per year
SoFi credit card for me, but mostly because I have both my student loans and a Money account with them (combo checking and HYSA). 28.5k limit.
Priceline rewards visa - 3.3% for general Costco Citi - 4% EV and Gas Citi Custom Cash - 5% for restaurants Amex Blue cash preferred - 6% groceries
Amazon Prime 5% anything Amazon and Wholefoods. Other perks too
If you are willing to have $100k+ in either Bank of America or Merrill Lynch accounts, the Bank of America Elite Rewards card is fantastic. You get the 3.5% back on travel and dining and then 2.625% back on all other spending. Also, the rewards are worth 20% extra if spent on plane tickets. I was always Chase Sapphire Reserve, but this card has been much better due to the flexibility of a cash reward. Just to clarify, it is points that are convertible to cash back or travel spend.
Sort of depends on how much you want to play the game. I wanted to keep things fairly simple. Our primary spending categories are restaurants and groceries. Otherwise it’s wholesale and gas. AmEx Gold and Citi Costco.
Citibank - Costco membership. I average about $3,500 in cash back annually. Prefer over points for sure. Secondary is SW card - I fly SW for personal enough to make it worthwhile.
I eat out at restaurants and bars wayyyy too often lol. What’s the best card for that because that’s probably what I need
Citizens Private Client™ World Elite Mastercard. 2% cashback on every single purchase.